G.I. Joe Archives - Page 2 of 4 - Robot 6 @ Comic Book Resources

It’s time once again for our monthly trip through Previews looking for cool, new comics. We’ve each picked the five comics we’re most anticipating in order to create a list of the best new stuff coming out two months from now.

As usual, please feel free to play along in the comments. Tell us what we missed that you’re looking forward to or – if you’re a comics creator – mention your own stuff.

G.I. Joe #1

Graeme McMillan

G.I. Joe #1: As if G.I. Joe wasn’t entirely in my guilty pleasure wheelhouse already, IDW Publishing relaunches the title with Fred Van Lente as writer and the tease of social and media commentary as the team is forced to go public in its fight against Cobra. Seriously, that’s just unfair, people. (IDW, $3.99)

Hawkeye, Vol. 1: My Life As A Weapon TP: One of the best-looking comics around, thanks to David Aja (and Javier Pulido, on a couple of the issues contained herein), and something that I suspect I’m going to want in a collected edition to give to friends wanting some fun, fast-moving action stuff to read. Best thing Matt Fraction’s done in a long time, too. (Marvel, $16.99)

New Tales of Old Palomar HC: Continuing my Love and Rockets education, a chance for me to pick up Gilbert Hernandez’ return to Palomar in this new collected edition of his Ignatz series. This is definitely my favorite of Beto’s work, so I’m happy to see more. (Fantagraphics, $22.99).

The Sixth Gun: Sons of The Gun #1: A new spin-off series from Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt’s spectacular horror western? Why, I really don’t mind if I do, thanks very much. For added benefit, having Brian Churilla show up for art duties is pretty sweet, as well. (Oni Press, $3.99)

Young Romance: A New 52 Valentine’s Day Special #1: Even if I’m feeling less than enthused about the majority of DC’s superhero line lately, I have to admit, the idea of a Valentine’s Day special one-off is just far too tempting for me to ignore. (DC Comics, $7.99).

While I was enjoying my time at APE up in San Francisco, the New York Comic Con was raging on with announcements and such. Before I get into a rundown of the comic-related news coming out of the East Coast today, let’s jump back to yesterday real quick so I can update one of the items from my Friday round-up. I mentioned that Dark Horse would publish a comic based on the upcoming video game The Last of Us, but I didn’t know at the time the most important part — the always awesome Faith Erin Hicks is co-writing AND drawing the comic. That’s a “Stop the presses” moment if I’ve ever seen one.

Ok, now on to Saturday …

• Apparently space is the place at NYCC … following DC’s announcement of Threshold yesterday, Marvel officially announced the return of two of their cosmic titles — Guardians of the Galaxy and Nova. Guardians, written by Brian Michael Bendis with art by Steve McNiven, comes out in February and apparently will feature Iron Man, or at least someone in his armor. Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness are the creative team for Nova, which features Sam Alexander, the Nova from Avengers vs. X-Men.

Anyway, Brian Kesinger is awesome and you should check out his blog and DeviantArt page. He also does steampunk other things, like Transformers, G.I. Joe, and Star Wars. But if steampunk’s not your thing, his Hip Hop Boba Fett and Pooh vs. Voldemort are cool, too. I posted bunch of my favorites below.

Welcome to Food or Comics?, where every week we talk about what comics we’d buy at our local comic shop based on certain spending limits — $15 and $30 — as well as what we’d get if we had extra money or a gift card to spend on a splurge item.

Here’s the thing: I really can’t decide if I want to spend part of my $15 this week on Before Watchmen: Minutemen #1 (DC, $3.99). On the one hand, it’s a new Darwyn Cooke comic, and on almost every other occasion, I’d be all over that. But on the other … It’s Before Watchmen. And I don’t even mean that in the “I have moral qualms about DC’s ‘ownership’ and use of the characters” sense — although I do — but in the “I didn’t actually LIKE Watchmen that much, so why should I be interested in a prequel?” sense. Let’s table that one, then, and wait and see what happens in the store. Instead, I’ll grab Earth 2 #2 (DC, $2.99), the new Simon Spurrier book Extermination #1 (BOOM!, $1) and the weirdly-coming-out-a-month-before-the-movie Amazing Spider-Man Movie Adaptation #1 (Marvel, $2.99), if only because it’s been years since I’ve read a comic book adaptation of a movie and I want to support Marvel’s odd apparently-spoiling-itself plan.

If I had $30, I’d put Spidey back on the shelf and grab the final DMZ collection (Vol. 12: The Five Nations of New York, DC $14.99). I’ve been following the collections of Brian Wood’s series for awhile, and have been patiently awaiting this one since the series wrapped in single issues awhile back. Don’t spoil it for me, please.

Splurge-wise, I’d likely pick up the GI Joe, Vol. 2: Cobra Command, Part 1 TP (IDW, $17.99). The movie may have been put back, but I don’t care; IDW’s Joe comics are my brand of military machismo, and I dropped off the single issues in favor of collections as soon as this crossover started. Time to get caught back up and try not to think about poor Channing Tatum.

Creators | Ahead of the premiere of the documentary With Great Power: The Stan Lee Story, the 89-year-old Lee discusses the big-screen success of his co-creations, the fairy-tale appeal of superheroes, his favorite character (he doesn’t have one), and a time when he was embarrassed to admit he wrote comic books: “Oh well, in the beginning, comics were the lowest rung on the cultural totem pole. I’d go to a party and people would say ‘What do you do?’ ‘Um, uh, I’m a writer’ and I’d try to walk away. And the guy would follow. ‘What do you write?’ ‘Oh, er, stories for kids.’ Well finally he’d pin me down and I’d say, ‘Okay, I write comic books’ — and boy, he couldn’t get away fast enough. Now, though, I walk into a party and someone sees me and they say, ‘Sorry, excuse me a minute, President Obama, I have to go over and say hello to Stan Lee.’ Well, okay. Slight exaggeration on my part.” [The Star-Ledger]

Publishers, creators, retailers and fans rolled into Chicago this weekend for the Chicago Comics and Entertainment Expo, or C2E2. While the convention officially kicked off Friday, the announcements started rolling out Thursday during the Diamond Retailer Summit. After going through Kiel Phegley’s lengthy report on CBR, I’ve pulled out a few tidbits that publishers shared with attending retailers:

• Dynamite Entertainment shared that the first issue of Garth Ennis and Aaron Campbell’s The Shadow, which comes out next week, will likely go to second print. Following their Vampirella and Pantha projects, they also plan to roll out more of the former Harris Publications characters they now own, and they said they plan to work again with Kevin Smith in the future, who they’ve worked with on Bionic Man and Green Hornet.

“CROSSOVER OF THE CENTURY ALERT: DANGER GIRL and GI JOE are teaming up! Campbell! Hartnell! Royle! Barber! Dunbier!” were the only words accompanying the artwork seen above, featuring Danger Girl Abbey Chase dressed as the Baroness. No further details were shared, but I’m betting we find out more this weekend at C2E2.

Update: Update: Kiel Phegley at CBR picks up a few more tidbits on the project at the Diamond Retailer Summit leading into C2E2: The series will be written by Scott Campbell and co-creator Andy Hartnell, and drawn by John Royle.

For many readers who grew up in the 1980s, Marvel’s G.I. Joe #21 stands out as one of those rare comics that changed, or informed, the way they viewed the medium — or, at the very least, made them say, “Wait, you can do that?” (Alternately, “Wait, is this a printing error?”) Titled “Silent Interlude,” the 1984 issue by Larry Hama is notable not only for introducing the ninja Storm Shadow but for telling the story of Snake-Eyes’ infiltration of Destro’s castle without using a single word balloon, sound effect or caption. Hence, “Silent Interlude.”

Now, nearly three decades later, The Sixth Gun collaborators Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt are paying tribute to Hama’s modern classic with a silent issue of their supernatural Western from Oni Press.

“And here’s the strange part … the kismet, if you will. We knew we were going to do this issue at this point in the story,” Bunn writes on his blog. “What we weren’t sure is how the issues would break down. And neither of us had the numbering for that great issue of G.I. Joe in mind. Awhile back, we were signing at a comic book shop. We mentioned our plans for a silent issue to the manager. He quickly replied, ‘Is it gonna be issue 21? You know, like G.I. Joe?’ Brian and I quickly started doing the math in our heads and realized that, yes, Becky’s invasion of the stronghold of the Knights of Solomon would be happening around that point. It was a pleasant surprise for both of us. How’s that for unintentional awesomeness?”

Welcome to Food or Comics?, where every week we talk about what comics we’d buy at our local comic shop based on certain spending limits — $15 and $30 — as well as what we’d get if we had extra money or a gift card to spend on a “Splurge” item.

If I had $15 I would be in comics heaven, starting with Shade #4 (DC, $2.99). I’ve loved what Cully Hamner and James Robinson have done so far, but seeing Darwyn Cooke drawing this issue knocks it up to a whole new level. It’s like seeing David Bowie sit in on an up-and-coming band’s gig one night. Next up would be the reunion of Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen in Secret Avengers #21 (Marvel, $3.99). I was halfway hoping they would break from the serious tone of the title and revisit the inanity of Nextwave, but the preview dashes that hope; still, excellent work of two guys at the top of their game. Next up would be Invincible #87 (Image, $2.99), promising an all-new level of beatdown for Mark Grayson. Lastly, I’d get Jason Aaron’s fresh take on Marvel’s mutants with Wolverine and the X-Men #4 (Marvel, $3.99). Part return to basics and part brand-new day, seeing Logan having to be the respectable one and not the plucky wildcard is fun, and the cast Aaron’s assembled is great.

If I had $30, I’d continue reading Aaron with Wolverine #300 (Marvel, $4.99). Jokes about the constant renumbering/reshuffling/rejiggering of Aaron’s run aside, it’s been a swell ride and looks to be heading up to a finale of sorts. Next up would be Batwoman #5 (DC, $2.99). Williams’ art continues to impress, and while the story doesn’t match up to his levels with Rucka on Detective Comics, he and Blackman are striving for something I haven’t been able to fully understand yet. Lastly, I’d pick up Northlanders #47 (DC/Vertigo, $2.99). Artist Declan Shalvey is an inspired get for this series, really showing off what he can do outside Marvel’s Thunderbolts.

If I could splurge, I’d dive into Eric Powell’s adaptation of Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (IDW, $19.99). Putting Powell together with Twain isn’t an obvious team-up, but given Powell’s depth of work I’m interested to see how it turns out.

Sales charts | Responding to an iFanboy article that speculates on what titles Marvel might cancel next, Men of War and Viking writer Ivan Brandon makes the case against sales charts and the subsequent analysis of them each month: “There’s an ongoing debate, for a bunch of years now. There are numbers that circulate every month, inaccurate numbers, people track them, people use that flawed ‘data’ to comment on what they see as the progress or decline on the list. A lot of comics professionals are against this, for a lot of reasons. In my case, for my books, the books I personally share copyright on … my reason is, and no offense to anyone out there: My income is none of your business. Just as your income is none of mine.”

Tom Spurgeon offers a counterpoint: “Sales information seems to me an obvious positive, not because it reveals the bank accounts of creators, but because what sells and to what extent is basic information about a marketplace, and the shape and potency of a marketplace seems to me a primary item of interest for anyone covering that marketplace. It’s foundational to our understanding of how things work and why. Certainly this information is already manipulated to brazen effect by companies with something to put over on customers; I have to imagine this would become worse under a system of no information at all being released.” [Ivan Brandon, The Comics Reporter]

Infestation 2, like its predecessor, will feature a supernatural threat that spreads into several different “universes” inhabited by IDW properties. Instead of zombies, this time around the threat is the “Old Ones” from horror writer H.P Lovercraft’s stories. Duane Swierczynski (Birds of Prey, Cable) and David Messina, who drew the original Infestation series, are the creative team on the two-issue Infestation 2 series, while other creative teams will tackle the related books featuring Transformers, G.I. Joe, 30 Days of Night and more. Here’s a breakdown of the event:

Infestation 2 #1 ($3.99, 32 pages, full color) will be available in stores on Jan. 25, with covers by Alex Garner and Livio Ramondelli.

Infestation 2: Transformers #1 and #2 will be in stores on Feb. 1 and 15, respectively. It’s by writer Chuck Dixon and artist Guido Guidi and is set in the “Hearts of Steel” timeline.

Infestation 2: Team-up one-shot will be in stores on Feb. 29, featuring the Weekly World News‘ Bat Boy and Groom Lake’s grey alien Archibald. It’s by Chris Ryall and Alan Robinson, with covers by Eric Powell and Bill Morrison.

Infestation 2: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1 and #2 will be in stores on March 7 and 21, respectively, by Tristan Jones and Mark Torres.

Infestation 2: G.I. Joe #1 and #2 will be in stores on March 14 and 28, respectively, by Mike Raicht and Valentine de Landro.

Infestation 2: 30 Days of Night one-shot will be in stores on April 4, by Swierczynski and artist Stuart Sayger.

Infestation 2 #2 will be available in stores on April 11.

Every issue of the event will feature a connected cover by artist Livio Ramondelli, and IDW will produce special incentive temporary tattoos with each issue. IDW will also release promotional ashcans in November with interviews and artwork.

IDW Publishing and comiXology have partnered to make the publisher’s complete library available digitally across all comiXology platforms — iOS, the Android and the Web.

Beginning today, the entire Transformers line, previously sold only through comiXology’s Android app or online store, will also be available through comiXology’s apps for the various Apple devices. Several new IDW titles, including the first issue of the new Star Trek ongoing, the first two issues of Locke & Key: Clockworks and the first six issues of G.I. Joe, will also appear starting today. More comics will be added later.

Previously IDW’s comics were only available on Apple’s iOS through iVerse and the various iVerse-created IDW apps.

“ComiXology customers have asked for IDW to be part of the Comics by comiXology lineup for some time, and we’re thrilled to bring our catalog to those readers,” Jeff Webber, IDW’s director of ePublishing, said in a statement. “We’ve always been impressed with comiXology’s strength in offering comics across multiple platforms, including Apple iOS, Android and the Web. David and his team have put together an awesome offering. ComiXology has established a huge audience — I know we’re going to make a lot of IDW fans happy this week.”

The San Diego Comic-Con runs kicks off with a preview night on July 20, then runs July 21-24. If you are a comics creator or publisher, and you’re planning to bring something new to the con — a sketchbook, a print, a graphic novel debut, anything! — then we want to hear from you. Drop me an email and let me know if you’ll have something cool on hand that attendees should know about. Feel free to send any artwork as well.

This time around we have panties from Pantheon (seriously), more Mimoco, word of an announcement by Dark Horse, plans for Viz and Arcana, several Hasbro exclusives and more. So let’s get to it …

Skullkickers creators Jim Zubkavich and Edwin Huang will be at the Image Comics booth #2729, selling hardcovers of the first volume of Skullkickers with an SDCC-exclusive cover. You can find more details here.

Comic-Con | ICv2 will host a Comics, Media, and Digital Conference on July 20, the afternoon before Comic-Con International kicks off in San Diego. The event will include panels on digital comics, comics in Hollywood and “Comics, Paper and Digital at Comic-Con 2013.” [press release]

Creators | Sean Witzke talks with King City creator Brandon Graham about world-building, collaborating with other writers or artists, porn and his approach to storytelling: “I’m really into the idea of conveying a story clearly enough for the reader to get all the basics while at the same time having enough information going on where you don’t necessarily get it all or even miss something on the first read through. I think it’s something that came from me reading a lot of European and Japanese comics growing up and just not always getting everything, culturally or just because of weird translations. I like that nice mystery. And there’s the idea that when a story doesn’t give you everything it forces the reader to think a little more. Turns them from being a passive reader to an active one. I think that would be my ideal destination, some kind of clear and simple with a background of complexity.” [supervillain]